Feel Honored

[Year two of the simulation, age sixteen.]

[Because of your nearly self-abusive undercover existence over the past two years, a karmic fate took shape amid blood and tears...]

[Congratulations on obtaining the R-rank fragment-"Endure Humiliation and Bear Burdens"!]

[Endure Humiliation and Bear Burdens: When you suffer malicious harm from external sources (beatings, cursed energy impacts), your body will produce compensatory vitality, increasing physical recovery by 50% and reducing pain feedback.]

[During the simulation, this fragment became your "curse."]

[It allowed you to miraculously survive Naoya's inhuman torture, even making your body firmer and more resistant to beatings through repeated injury and recovery.]

[Naoya grew increasingly satisfied with you, his "durable piece of furniture," and even took you along when he trained in the mountains behind the estate.]

[However, misfortune never failed to arrive. A Semi-Grade 1 Cursed Spirit captured by the Zenin Clan for trials broke through its seal.]

[The monster's body resembled a mass of rotting entrails, dozens of eyeballs spinning wildly across its surface. The purple-green acid it spewed corroded the surrounding trees into charcoal in an instant.]

["Tch, what a pain. Of all the times!"]

[Naoya Zenin, who was training in the mountains behind the estate, had depleted his cursed energy and had brought no cursed tools. Watching the acid roar toward him, the prodigious young master did not hesitate even slightly. He reached back and grabbed your collar.]

["Hey, since you're a dog, shouldn't you protect your master at a time like this?"]

[Naoya Zenin's voice rang out beside your ear, carrying a cold indifference that took it all for granted.]

[The next second, he hurled you like a sandbag, slamming you straight at the charging Semi-Grade 1 Cursed Spirit! He used you to block the cursed spirit's wide-area attack.]

[He did not hesitate in the slightest, nor did he show a trace of remorse that acknowledged you as human. In his eyes, your life was worth only the second it bought him to adjust his cursed technique.]

[**Sizzle-**]

[The purple-green slime the cursed spirit spat poured down like a torrential rain. It was not ordinary water, but corrosive acid imbued with powerful cursed energy. The instant it touched your skin, it was like hot oil splashing onto a wax figure. Your skin immediately blistered, ulcerated, and melted away.]

[The agony was beyond what an ordinary person could endure.]

["This is what you're worth. Feel honored."]

[Watching the gaping, bloody maw draw closer, and the blond boy behind you retreat at leisure with a mocking expression, using the time you had bought him, you understood.]

[An ordinary person would have passed out long ago, but "Endure Humiliation and Bear Burdens" forced you to remain conscious, making you watch your own flesh peel away.]

[True despair came from behind.]

["Stop moving. Block it properly."]

[A palm wrapped in brutal cursed energy pressed firmly against your back. Naoya treated you as a human shield, and even more than that, as a "conductive medium."]

[Pushing your battered, hole-riddled body ahead of him, he forced his way in.]

["Die, you piece of shit."]

[Naoya sneered. Those words were meant for the cursed spirit, and for you as well.]

[**Bang-!**]

[A heavy punch blasted into your back, shattering your spine and ribs before bursting out through your chest in a spray of bloody froth!]

[Striking the ox through the mountain-you were the mountain, and you were also the ox.]

[Using your body as cover, Naoya shattered the cursed spirit's core without suffering a scratch.]

[Compared with the cursed spirit's corrosion, this heavy punch through your chest was the true culprit that ended your life.]

[The cursed spirit dissolved into black ash. You collapsed into the mud like a torn rag, blood gushing from the great hole in your chest.]

[Your vision began to blur. In the final seconds of your life, you saw Naoya Zenin shake the blood from his hand and inspect his expensive silk kimono with a look of disgust.]

[He discovered a drop of your blood on his cuff.]

["Tch, what rotten luck."]

[The Zenin Clan's prodigious young master frowned, not even bothering to glance at you dying at his feet. He simply kept rubbing at the stain with a handkerchief.]

["Trash is trash. Even after two years, your blood still stinks this much. You ruined a perfectly good outfit."]

[Until you breathed your last, the Zenin elites who rushed over to fawn over him never let their gazes linger on you for even a second.]

[The first to arrive was the elite unit "Hei," its members dressed in matching uniforms, each radiating powerful fluctuations of cursed energy.]

[Close behind them came the "Kukuru Unit," a troop of men without cursed techniques who wore black face coverings, their expressions vacant, knowing nothing but obedience to orders.]

["**Master Naoya!!**"]

[When Hei member Ranta Zenin saw the devastation at the scene, his expression changed drastically. He instantly flashed to Naoya's side, his face filled with fear and concern.]

["Are you all right? We guards arrived too late!"]

["Are you hurt? Hurry! Where the hell is the medical team!"]

[They crowded around the blond boy, fussing over him as though losing a single hair would have been a catastrophe.]

[And you lay less than half a meter from their feet.]

[Yet these so-called clan elites never let their gazes linger on you for even a second.]

[One member of the Kukuru Unit even found you an obstruction and kicked your still-warm corpse aside. "Stay out of the way, trash."]

[Until you drew your final breath, neither Naoya nor the Zenin Clan members showed even the slightest respect for you as a "human being." To Naoya, the loss of a stained outfit troubled him far more than your life.]

[You died.]

[The karma from this simulation has been settled.]

[Karmic feedback loaded!]

[Your total cursed energy has increased according to the number of simulated years. Current cursed energy: 10 (5 × 2).]

[You inherited two years of experience enduring blows and the fragments: "Cursed Energy Allergy" (N), "Endure Humiliation and Bear Burdens" (R).]